Searching Words
by sifuXANA
Summary: Zuko's quest to find his mother didn't turn out exactly the way he'd expected. These are the conversations that follow. Based on The Search comic series.
1. Ursa

_A/N: This first chapter is sort of a rewrite of the conversation Zuko has with his mother at the end of the comic The Search part 3. I actually liked how it was written-the style was good for a shorter comic-but I wanted to expand on it. _

_I really appreciate reviews! I don't want to guilt anybody into reviewing, but suggestions and feedback are really helpful. _

_Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar: The Last Airbender. This holds true for every chapter of this story._

* * *

Before Zuko knows it, the night is over. New energy coursing through his body alerts him to the rising sun. After everything that's happened these past few days, especially last night, it's strange being somewhere so…quiet. He thinks of Azula for a second, her screaming, her lightning, the echo her presence has left on this place. Zuko's mind is too full. He needs to meditate, but he knows that's only a temporary solution.

He watches the horizon for a moment before turning back to face the modest, partially destroyed house. Ikem and Kiyi—_your mother's new family_, he reminds himself—sit outside around a fire. Ikem's cooking breakfast. Zuko feels momentary longing before shoving it away. When he turns around, he sees Ursa, also watching the two, an indecipherable look on her face.

He doesn't know why he's been so hesitant to talk to his mother. It's been so many years: he should be so excited to see her, he should be telling her everything about his life that she's missed and listening to her own stories. But he feels all too strongly that things have changed, irreparably. His mother isn't the same woman she used to be and while he still loves her, he has to accept that he'll never be able to go back, not really. Ursa will never be his mother the same way she used to be.

Zuko doesn't want to feel bitter about her new family—he's happy, after all, to discover more family members who presumably don't want to kill him—but he can't help the slight resentment he feels when he watches Ursa playing with Kiyi or sitting beside Ikem, touching his shoulder. Thoughts come to him occasionally, completely unfair thoughts about her abandoning him, replacing him, forgetting him. He knows she saved his life, but he never expected to find her like this.

"You should go to them," Zuko says to her. He keeps his face neutral, his voice steady.

Ursa is studying him. "No," she replies. "You and I need to talk."

The way she says it, calmly but in control, reminds him so much of when he was a child that he almost cries, or laughs, or both. Instead, he just follows her.

"Mom, I—" he hesitates. That word sounds so foreign in his mouth. She shakes her head almost imperceptibly.

"Zuko, what I said to Azula…I owe you that same apology. I'm sorry I didn't love you enough."

Zuko's heart lurches painfully. He'd pictured their reunion so differently. And he'd pictured it so many times, for so many years. "Don't say that," he tells her quietly.

"But it's true." Her gaze turns to the floor. "I…I _forgot_ you. What kind of mother forgets her son?"

Her words echo the cruel thoughts that swam unbidden through Zuko's mind only minutes ago and he feels guilty instantly. He studies his mother's face, silent for a moment. She looks a little older—slight beginnings of lines around her eyes and in the corners of her mouth—but still as beautiful as he remembers her. He realizes that he doesn't blame her for anything. He's never really blamed her.

"You saved my life," he says finally. "If it wasn't for you, he would have killed me."

Ursa's eyes meet his. "I know it was selfish of me. I should have watched over you. I wasn't there to protect you from Ozai…" she trails off, and Zuko knows she is looking at his scar as if she knows who gave it to him. He almost turns away, but instead pulls the letter from his robes, reminded by the mention of Ozai. He hands it to her wordlessly.

His mother looks impossibly sad and tired as she reads it. "What I wrote here…isn't true," she says, and she proceeds to explain it to him evenly, carefully. Zuko listens, and thinks he finally understands.

"I don't know if you remember. He was never really kind to you, Zuko, but after that…he went out of his way to hurt you. I'm so sorry. I should have known better than to provoke Ozai."

Zuko knows that's not the only reason his father hates him: Ozai's utter disdain for him runs far, far deeper. But right now it doesn't matter to him at all. He straightens up. "I'm glad you said that to him, Mom. I—I'm glad he treated me that way. It made me strong in the end, and I turned out nothing like him."

Smiling gently, Ursa studies him. "You look so handsome, Zuko. I may not have a right to be, but I'm so proud of you. You'll make a great Fire Lord."

Suddenly she looks just like a proud mother, but like someone else's proud mother. Why does she feel so distant from him? "I thought maybe you wouldn't recognize me," Zuko blurts out suddenly.

When the Mother of Faces had released his mother, she'd turned towards him, tears already in her eyes. She'd hugged him, and, helplessly, he hugged her back, thinking of how he used to feel so small, so safe in her arms. Now he's larger than her. He doesn't need her protection anymore. And when she pulled back, looking him over, he'd been waiting for her to mention his scar, to flinch away from it, anything. But she'd just laid her hand on it, gently, her eyes full of something he didn't understand, and pulled him back into the hug.

"I've missed so much," Ursa tells him. "But as long as you know who you are, I will recognize you."

"Will you tell me everything?" he asks.

She smiles at him, and she's his mother again, but at the same time, his equal. "For you," she says, "I'll start from the beginning."


	2. Ikem

Ursa's story is a long one, as is Zuko's, and when they return from their walk, Ikem informs them that Aang, Sokka, and Katara have gone into town. "They want to help rebuild our house," he says. "They said they were going to find materials, but…I'm pretty sure they were just looking for some snacks."

Part of Zuko doesn't want to stay here any longer, but another part of him wants to get to know this little step-family he's only just discovered. Awkwardly, he nods, then asks, "Don't you have a rehearsal?"

"We'll start in the afternoon," Ikem says, his eyes friendly. "My family is more important." Zuko half smiles, not sure if he's included or not.

At his side, Ursa touches his arm. He goes with her inside the house, where she finds the cleanest corner and sits. Zuko joins her.

"Tell me what you're thinking," she says, concerned.

He almost laughs, there's so much running through his head. He's sure he'll have a million questions later, but right now the only thing that comes to mind is "Mom…did you always hate him?"

It's a hard question, and she pauses for a moment. Zuko almost regrets asking. Finally, she says, "There was a time when I cared for Ozai. And I think I could have grown to love him, maybe. But power and greed changed him. So I guess…no. I didn't always hate him. There was a time when things were different. But it was such a brief period, it barely counted for anything."

Zuko's unsure of how to respond, so he just says, "I'll have your marriage officially annulled, so there won't be any problems for you."

"Thank you."

"So you're…staying here." It's not a question since he knows the answer to it. He'd always imagined that when he found his mother, she'd gladly go back with him to Capital City. It had never occurred to him that it wasn't her home. And she'd built a life here.

Ursa takes a deep breath. "Yes. But Zuko," her eyes are searching his face again, "you're welcome to come anytime. My home is always open to you."

He nods, but he's out of words. She sighs and stands up. "I need to go…reacquaint myself with Kiyi. Some things have changed." Ursa gestures at her face, and Zuko smiles.

When she leaves, he looks around the house. It's simple, and was neat before Azula came in. Despite the lack of decoration—nothing fancy like what he grew up with, no family portraits, no ancient artifacts—it's the most beautiful home he's been in.

Only a few minutes pass before Ikem comes inside. He sees Zuko and sits down beside him. "Do we need to talk?"

"I don't know," Zuko mumbles, looking away. "Maybe."

He can feel Ikem's gaze and it makes him uncomfortable, though he tries not to show it. The theater director sighs. Zuko tries to picture himself a part of this family, raised by this man, and fails spectacularly.

"Do you blame me at all?" Ikem asks.

It takes Zuko a minute to think of how to answer. In the back of his mind, in some twisted way, he supposes that maybe he does. "No," he says. "You love her more than me. I mean, uh, you didn't know me."

"I'm sorry," Ikem replies after a minute. "But I'd do it again. I don't want to ever see her in pain." He makes eye contact with Zuko, who flinches back a little, involuntarily. For such an ordinary man, his eyes are fiery, burning into Zuko's. He seems to be searching Zuko for something, some sort of response, something held back. Zuko steadies himself.

"I understand."

Ikem softens their eye contact at that. His fingers twine around each other, back and forth, and Zuko wonders fleetingly if he's nervous. "At first, Ursa talked about you all the time," he says, a story forming behind his words. "You and your sister. She told me how she was worried about both of you, how Ozai was hurting you both. She told me stories about you, she told me what you liked and disliked, what you dreamed about. But remembering you only hurt her, so gradually she stopped talking about you at all." He seems to want some sort of reaction, but Zuko refuses to give it. "So I gathered information on my own, after we met the Mother of Faces. Didn't you wonder how I recognized you?"

"Yes. I did. I'm Fire Lord now, but still no one else has seemed to recognize me," Zuko replies. Whenever he stopped at ports or towns during his banishment, he was constantly preoccupied with trying to read the reactions of the people around him. Most would glance at his scar and either stare conspicuously or look away quickly. Zuko found himself staring back, trying to gauge from faces who actually knew his identity or his story. Most people were ignorant; even his own crew hadn't known for years. But there was always the odd Earth Kingdom laborer or village gossip monger who studied him with a knowing expression that he couldn't stand. And of course, most Fire Nation citizens with higher status knew. They'd _been_ there.

It didn't surprise him then that most people didn't know him immediately from his scar—it came in handy sometimes, like during his time in Ba Sing Se—but it was even more surprising now that he was Fire Lord. Although, most of the time he really didn't mind. Somewhere deep inside him, he knows he's more suited to the shadows.

"I heard a lot about your sister," Ikem tells him. "She was a prodigy from the beginning, wasn't she? There was always news about her accomplishments floating around."

"Of course," Zuko says dryly.

Smiling faintly, Ikem continues, "It was almost like I was doing what your mother had wanted to do. I was watching you grow up from afar." He coughs once. "Fire Nation soldiers pass through here sometimes. I heard from a general how you'd spoken out during a war meeting. Soldiers love to trade gossip, surprisingly. I heard from them about your Agni Kai, about your banishment, about…" his voice fades out, but Zuko still hears the unspoken words. _Your scar_. His face burns and he ducks his head. He'd rather be anywhere but here, he'd rather talk about this with anyone but this man he hardly knows. Even after all these years, he still feels shame.

"Fire Lord. Zuko," Ikem says, noticing the effect his words have had. "I was proud of you, when I heard about the war meeting. For speaking out. You weren't my son, I didn't even know you, but I was still proud of you."

The words ring in Zuko's ears, taunting him vaguely.

"I heard about your search for the Avatar, I heard about your struggles, I heard about your fight with Azula. I heard about how the Fire Lord was imprisoned and the Fire Princess institutionalized." Frowning lightly, Ikem adds, "Some kind of nomad cabbage merchant passed through with a startling amount of news."

Zuko's surprised to hear himself laugh. "So you knew I'd come here."

"I figured there would come a time when you would try to find your mother. And I knew that once you'd learned where she was from, you'd come looking here. It was only a matter of time."

"But…you didn't want me to figure it out."

Ikem admits, "I didn't want things to change. I wanted you to know that your mother was safe and happy, but I didn't know how to do that without telling you everything. But when you came back during dinner…I was going to let you leave, but for some reason, I just couldn't. I knew I couldn't avoid it any longer."

He might never have seen his mother—the mother who remembered him—again if it weren't for that. It was the smallest things.

"I knew everything about you, but you were so distant to me," Ikem is saying. "You weren't a real person to me…until that moment. And I gave you a chance."

Zuko closes his eyes, tries to picture himself going home knowing his mother would never remember him, never know that with everything he did, he was struggling to follow the last thing she had told him. He imagines his mother, safe and happy here where she belongs, but completely oblivious to him. He opens his eyes and bows his head. "Thank you."

Ikem rises to his feet. At the door, he nods at Zuko. "Fire Lord. You are welcome here anytime." Then he's gone.

Zuko sits in the empty house, sun streaming in, for a long, long time.


	3. Epilogue

The Gaang returns bearing both snacks and supplies, and while Ursa and Ikem (Noriko and Noren? Zuko's not sure what to call them, really) help them fix the roof and other various destroyed parts of the house, Kiyi attacks Zuko and forces him to play dolls. It's hard for him to admit, but for some reason he actually enjoys himself. Kiyi's his half-sister, after all, and he's happy to spend a little time with her. She's definitely a better sport than Azula was. It is a little humiliating though, so Zuko's glad when the work is finally finished, at least partway, and the Gaang come to retrieve him.

Kiyi hugs him around the waist like she's never going to let him go. She's convinced that he's her new best friend, and even though she won't stop trying to poke his scar, he's a little touched. He pats her head awkwardly. "I'll come visit," he promises, and wonders if he will.

Ikem claps him on the shoulder and nods at him before pulling Kiyi away. At the other end of the house, Aang, Katara and Sokka are talking to Zuko's mother. He makes a mental note to discuss it with them later.

When Ursa comes over, her face is more open than he ever remembers seeing it. She gives him a hug that's short but deep and murmurs into his hair, "My son."

This whole trip has been a whirlwind Zuko couldn't control. He steps back, now, and surrenders to it. "Mom," he begins, but finds he can't put anything into words. His mother looks at him like she understands, though, so it's okay.

"Come visit me anytime, Zuko," she says. "I'm counting on it."

He nods, she nods, and then they leave.

* * *

As they head back to the capital, Sokka mentions Azula and Zuko's mouth goes dry. He'd pushed her to the back of his mind, but he can't help wondering where she is, if she's alright, if she's set anybody on fire yet. Her last words to him echo in his mind—_same as always, Zuzu. Even when you're strong…you're weak._ Maybe she'll never see that his weakness is what makes him human, what makes him strong.

Then Aang asks him about his mother. All kinds of images run through Zuko's mind, pieces of his life he's never been able to connect before. After so many years of struggling, everything is finally coming together. There's still Ozai, because it's so hard not to let his father haunt him from the prison forever. There's still Azula, because no matter what she does to him, she's his sister and he'll never stop worrying about her. But he realizes that, after everything, this is the most okay he's been in such a long time. After everything, he's okay.


End file.
